IRAN SAYS AN ATTEMPTED COUP BY ARMY GROUP WAS FOILED

AP

Published: June 28, 1982

MANAMA, Bahrain, June 27—
Reports from Teheran said tonight that the Iranian Government had put down an attempted military coup. The Bahrain-based Gulf News Agency quoted the Iranian afternoon newspaper Ettelaat as saying ''a first batch'' of conspirators would be tried shortly by a military tribunal.

The paper said they were part of an underground army group called Nima that had made detailed plans for a coup, including formation of a military government headed by a colonel identified as Azar Dahkan. No other details were given.

The last bungled coup reported in Iran purportedly was headed by Sadegh Ghotbzadeh, a former Foreign Minister, who is awaiting trial. Ayatollah Kazem Shariatmadari, a leading Iranian clergyman, was also accused of complicity in that plot.

Mr. Ghotbzadeh and about 40 others held as co-conspirators were arrested in April on a charge of planning to shell Ayatollah Khomeini's north Teheran residence with long-range artillery and seize the country's revolutionary commands to proclaim a new regime.

Mr. Ghotbzadeh, once one of Ayatollah Khomeini's closest aides, admitted on Teheran's state television that he had masterminded the coup plot and said he would ''willingly welcome any punishment,'' according to the official press agency Irna. The charges against him are punishable by death in revolutionary Iran.

The Iranian Government also accused Prince Abdullah, commander of the Saudi national guard and now crown prince of Iran's oil-rich Arab neighbor, of having been involved in the April coup attempt. Saudi Arabia denied the charge.